EwokChilli

RPM definitely isn't useless for 51/2/18 Blood. Honestly, I don't see much of a use for it for Frost. If you have 4pT7, then you'll be weaving FS 1-2 times in your rotation and will never come near runic cap. If you don't have 4pT7, then you won't be getting near 100 RP as long as you use the FS glyph (because you make 75 RP with a normal IT BS OB OB or IT PS OB BS BS rotation). Even the person who came up with the ITx6 rotation stated that you should weave FS in between your ITx2 so you didn't cap your RP.

On a side note, if they decide to rebuff HB (which is possible) then we could do a rotation similar to our old IT OB BS OB rotation except it's PS HB BS OB. If they can make HB just hit as hard as it use to, then we would have a less OB-centric build for when we take off our 4pT7 for Ulduar gear.

What I'm going to need though, is a Sigil for Frost Strike because Sigil of Awareness keeps getting more awkward with the new rotations.

 

Feorthas

Eh, I'll agree that RPM may be rather useful prior to hitcap but Frost Strike cannot be avoided and it isn't too horribly hard to Expertise cap without intentionally pushing for it (I did so in 21/50 a few weeks ago). So, my Icy Touches can miss or be avoided but nothing else really has any issue connecting. I'm also way over hitcap until I get a T7/7.5 helm--I have pieces ready to go once that comes along though (or I may have swapped already; unsure. If armory says I have Frozen Pain / T7.5 pants, I've swapped without the helm)--so IT doesn't really miss either *shrug*.

Once avoidance is taken care of, life becomes a LOT more predictable.

I am not your personal Frost Deathknight knowledge base. If you have a simple question, ask in the simple questions thread; if you have a more esoteric, specific, or complicated question, ask in the spec-appropriate thread.

My PM, WoWmail, and, especially, chat boxes are NOT the appropriate places for these questions.

 

Veala

Is it better for your dps to spend RP on 40 RP death coils for 1500 damage each or to spend just enough RP so that you're RP capped when you land and have 4 Frost Strikes ready to go? Same with Heigan, why waste RP on Death Coils during the dance when you can stockpile it for extra Frost Strikes when he comes back down again? Until we know more about the mechanics of the Ulduar bosses it's hard to make a judgement, but I just can't imagine losing that flexibility being worth 20 ap or so.

I see your point about delaying all of the eventual effects of a single rune in my priority system Goetter, I'll have to play around with it next raid and see if it ups my dps =p

 

Mild Confusion

On Heigan, I simply run close enough to hit him with IT, HB, BB, BB, DC repeat untill he is down off his platform.

 

Khaosknight

As far as the debate on RPM is concerned, in a min/max sense, assuming perfect performance on every fight, it IS useless. That said, It provides the same type of buff that the old Unholy Aura talent did, It provides, for lack of a better term, wiggle room. On movement fights where a perfect rotation cannot be maintained, and a priority system will be signifigantly messed up, due to not fighting 100% of the time, having that extra 30 RP potential can really help. It ultimately comes down to personal preference, 20 - 40 extra AP, or some extra wiggle room in certain situations. Keep in mine that it is a first tier talent as well, and should not be compared to talents much lower in the tree.

As far as UA is concerned, whomever brought that up, yeah it's 8.3% I did the math wrong. I'm sad to hear that it uses a rune and causes a gcd, but that just means that we'll keep using our bloodtap/UA Macros.

Now then, as far as being 'pidgeonholed' into IT/PS spam builds, I believe that It's pretty much become a matter of preference at this point, the DPS provided by 1-51-19 or some variant of that is pretty much equally comparable to the DPS of 46-25 and variants of that. Overall I think the two rotations are

IT PS IT PS BS BS
IT PS IT PS IT IT

and

IT PS BS BS OB

OB OB OB

right?

what was the 5xOb rotation mentioned earlier? did it involve speccing into DRM or something?

 

Odii

RMP's usefulness is solely dependent on 1 thing: are you GCD limited in your rotation?

If the answer is yes you dont need it.

If the answer is no, I think its quite useful. The reason being is that FS is by far the most efficient use of RP. Even without killing machine, it will destroy DC on damage, and its even worse if you have the FS glyph and not the new DC one in 3.1 (and you shouldnt). If you are not GCD limited then, during those times that you build excess RP, you can then bleed the excess off over time adding an additional FS every rotation.

For example, if you use UP with the current IT, OBx2, BS rotation because latency is pushing your rotation, you probably can execute more FS's in your rotation then you normally generate RP for. Using DC at range to keep from RP capping is actually wasting DPS. In fights where you are AEing with Howling blast, you are going to want to use as little RP during the AE phases because a FS will eat KMs that are better used for HB. You can then save that RP for single target fighting.

Even if your rotation doesnt normally have free GCDs, you can still make use of stored RP better DPS. For example in the 6 IT rotation, if you find yourself moving to range and storing RP when using IT, when you reenter range you can easily reduce the number of ITs, replacing them with OBs, creating GCD spaces for the extra built up frost strikes. For example a 6 IT rotation might call for 3 ITs, 1 OB, and 1 BS, generating 115 RP for FSs, but you could instead do 1 IT, 2 OBs, 1 BS, fill the empty GCD with 1 extra FS. You would only generate 95 RP, and consume 32, for a loss of 52 RP, but the 1 1.3 DC+2Its arent going to match the damage you would get from 1OB+1FS, especially if it means a KM proc goes to a FS instead of an IT.

No. It involves using the new Pestience glyphs to keep your diseases running without having to PS+IT again. That frees you to use either a UF pair or a DD pair for an extra OB, at the cost of a BS. Its a damage loser, but a GCD gain. So wether it turns out to be worth anything or not is if there is a DPS advantage to shortening the rotation by 1 GCD that is worth sacrificing a blood strike (minus OB-(PS+IT) damage i suppose.

 

teiglin

On the topic of pestilence glyph rotation instead of standard rotation, you're basically comparing

Pest BS OB FS OB FS
FS OB OB FS OB FS

to

PS IT OB BS BS FS
FS OB OB FS OB FS

Pest rotation has 5x OB, 1x BS, 5x FS. Standard rotation has PS, IT, 2x BS, 4x OB, 4x FS. So you gain 1 OB and 1 FS at the cost of IT, PS, and BS. Assuming you use OB/FS/ghoul glyphs (and not PS, just to simplify), that's 126% physical weapon damage and 69% weapon damage as frost vs. 113% weapon damage from PS+BS and an IT, which overall should be a fair amount less than the pestilence rotation. However, standard rotation also has the chance of Freezing Fog procs for a free HB, which shouldn't delay your rotation (would be a 13th GCD), so add about 15% of a HB to this on average. Both rotations require 4t7 and thus have a little bit of free RP to squeeze in an extra FS periodically. PS glyph raises PS+BS to 143% weapon damage, so that might be enough to beat out the damage advantage a FS has over an IT.

Spec-wise, pestilence rotation never casts IT and thus can't keep up 20% haste from IIT, and so could spec out of imp IT, Icy Talons, and IIT, but the only real alternative is toughness; as pestilence rotation requires epidemic, I suspect perma-ghoul + necrosis will out-perform 2H spec and bladed armor. Either way, it will probably be worth taking IIT just for its passive 5% haste.

Standard spec can of course pick between standard 2H spec + bladed armor + dark conviction and perma-ghoul; I don't have a clear sense of which is better, but I think ghoul should do more than enough to make up the loss in blood as long as it isn't dying much, so this will depend heavily on the amount of damage pets take in ulduar.

 

Rham

is it possible to get an update to the OP, otherwise a new thread maybe in order just keep that opening post as informative as the unholy and blood OPs are.

 

yek366

Going along with the current RPM discussion, it isn't a dps increase if you stand still and use a normal rotation where FS is highest priority at any given time. However, I almost always start a fight with near 120 RP (I'll hit IT at the start to cap) and then spam FS off the bat. Yes, it is not a good use of KM procs, but it's basically during the first 10 seconds of a fight.

Another example is like what was mentioned about Heigan. During the dance phase, I spam IT and BB for ranged rune damage, and DC for RP damage. Just as I said above, I will get my RP full when the phase ends, and I can IT-> FS spam when he comes off the platform.

One more thing... I tend to be lazy and not respec for bgs. When I get kited, use shell, or whatever, I gain RP faster than I can even consume it. Maybe this is a valid point, and maybe not due to dual spec. Granted, my 2nd spec might be tank rather than PvP.

These are just a few instances where it can be slightly more useful, but on bosses like Patchwerk (which won't exist in Ulduar that I know of) it does next to nothing. All in all, I would still take it over the ~20 AP from toughness.

 

crunchyblack

I totally agree with this. Feorthas, you seem to have the frost theorycrafting down to a science, I think you'd be a great candidate to make the new thread, with a very informative, up-to-date front page. Obviously you probably have other things goin on, but if you have the time it would be awesome.

 

EwokChilli

You are forgetting that FS is modified by both Black Ice and Glacial Rot as well, so it's nearly 100% weapon dmg as frost. With that said, you're comparing OB+Pest (40 RP) to IT+PS+BS (30 RP), so why are you concluding that you get 1 more FS out of the equation. If we count FS, then our rotation is doing about 1250% weapon dmg per 20 seconds with the dots ticking as well. The 5 OB rotation would have to go unholy just to keep the diseases up and hope that you aren't lagging bad or else they're going to expire before you can Pest again, but then you drop a OB for IT+PS to reapply. If they increase diseases to 24 seconds (15 + 3/3 epidemic instead of 2/2 epidemic), it'll make it much easier. I'm kind of leaning towards something like 3/51/17, using OB,FS,Ghoul, or swapping Ghoul for Pest if Pest is a major glyph now.

 

Feorthas

You pretty much nailed why I haven't just gone and made a new thread already but I'll get a new topic down and reserve the first three posts today.

Until there is real content in that thread--say, at least one solid post worth of current Frost theory--please refrain from posting there and keep posting here instead so that I can get things organized and set up more on my schedule than as quickly as humanly possible (which isn't possible while I'm at work :p).

I am not your personal Frost Deathknight knowledge base. If you have a simple question, ask in the simple questions thread; if you have a more esoteric, specific, or complicated question, ask in the spec-appropriate thread.

My PM, WoWmail, and, especially, chat boxes are NOT the appropriate places for these questions.

 

EwokChilli

Wow > work.

On other note, has anyone played around with the HB glyph? Does it accurately apply FF to everything and apply Chillbains accordingly? Could then use HB and PS to reapply diseases and sub unholy for 21 second diseases and pet. PS HB FS BS OB FS -> BS OB FS BS OB FS FS.

So, back on the subject of OBx5, would it be better to lose 1 TS and HB to get 2/2 Dirge for the OB spam? It's an extra 25 RP per 20 sec rotations, but you'd have to lose 9% OB/BS crit, HB, and 1 pt of TS. Would an extra FS be worth it? We would go from 170 RP to 195 RP per 20 seconds. That would be exactly enough for 6 FS every full 20 second rotation. So, 1 FS > 9% OB/BS crit, HB (option), and 2% special dmg?

 

Buanna

OB+Pest is 30 RP. IT+PS+BS is 35. Both assuming Chill of the Grave.

So is OB > IT+PS+BS+5RP? Something to test.

Boni and Bonii are not words.
Bonuses is.

 

Odii

OB and one less GCD. If you are pushing over 10 seconds per runeset, that can drastically change the math

Then again, I think hes talking about a spec that forgoes Icy Touch glyph and assumes the 4pcT7, so it is 40-35 RP wise in favor of OB pest.

 

Goetterdaemmerung

Numbers!

OB+Pest:
Requires Pest glyph, so no IT glyph. 40 RP with 4pcT7

IT+PS+BS:
Does not require pest glyph, so you get the IT glyph. 45 RP with 4pcT7.

 

Travaggie

This is also comparing 3 GCDs to 2, which if you are in blood presence and using every available GCD, can make a big difference.

 

teiglin

You're right, I forgot about the additional multipliers on FS, though I was trying to separate FS weapon damage percentage from OB/BS/PS (physical) weapon damage percentage, as comparing those two directly has fairly obvious flaws. Off the top of my head I don't know what percent physical damage is mitigated by armor (and this of course varies with your ArP) nor do I know what percent of FS damage one can expect to lose to partial resists, so I was trying more to compare the physical damage and frost damage separately.

As for why I included an entire additional FS in the 5xOB rotation, that was the number of FS I could fit without delaying the rotation at all. When I look at it the way you put it, it's actually only 5 RP more for the OB rotation (CotG gives you 15 RP from your IT, so IT+PS+BS is 35 to pest+OB's 40). So realistically, maybe we should be comparing IT+PS+BS to OB+pest+5/32 of an FS+a free GCD.

I also hadn't considered that the new pestilence glyph might be major. If so, it'd certainly not be worth it, as you'd have to drop probably ghoul glyph, meaning either an unfortunate spec like 11/51/7 with epidemic but no perma-ghoul, or lose out on a lot of FS or OB damage from their glyphs. Standard rotation of course can choose between the usual 17 in blood or a perma-ghoul, with the former probably getting more out of IT or PS glyph than ghoul. And as was mentioned above, IT glyph actually gives the IT+PS+BS a RP advantage over OB+pest, though I'm not sure you'd normally have the GCDs to take advantage of it.

Yeah, for the "direct" comparison, I was assuming that both specs would use unholy subspec for simplicity, meaning OB/FS/ghoul glyphs, and yes, 4t7 is pretty much assumed for any OB spec at this point I'd think. Of course that will change once we all have full ulduar gear, but unless t8 set bonuses are amazing, I don't see breaking 4t7 any time soon.

 

bluerage

I see a lot of people discussing going into the Unholy tree to pick up a permanent ghoul but the main thing that concerns me with this spec is that you are placing a big portion of your dps in the hands of a pet that can easily die and has a significant cooldown to respawn.

To me one of the biggest strengths of the frost spec has always been independence from relying on a pet for damage (other than the normal non-pet ghoul of course). Currently in live we subspect into blood because it boosts our main sources of damage (Obliterate and Frost Strike) through extra AP, more 2H damage, and more crit. I'm just wary that people are putting too much dependence in Unholy talents that may not pan out in a real raid situation.

 

Grigori

You have it backwards. On live it is worth it to spec into ghoul+Impurity, on PTR it is not.

With optimal itemization and full buffs/debuffs, Impurity boosts your spell damage by almost 20%. Considering Impurity's numbers, Blizzard's original intent for the talent was probably to boost mixed spell/strike rotations (SS+DC, OB/HS+DC, IT+FS, and the like). DW obviously broke that by chucking almost all spells. With Impurity+pre-nerf KM, HB was averging damage that made even 2H FSs look like lichslaps with wet noodles.

However, for 2H builds with spell/strike rotations where strikes constitute a higher percentage of its rotation damage, boosting both spells and strikes by 10% with TS will obviously net more damage than boosting only spells by under 20%. Perma-ghoul is worth 500+ DPS, but on live you don't have the option of picking TS+ghoul over Impurity+ghoul. If those tier-4 perma-ghouls on PTR make it to live, you will.

Still, one good reason to go with Impurity is if Ulduar turns out to be so movement-heavy that you end up having to chuck your rotation from range for extended periods. However, much of the gain from extra IT/DC damage is mitigated by the loss of HB (for both Unholy runes and Rime). Also, if you do go that route, you will want to change your proposed tank-n'-spank rotation to something like...

IT>PS>fs>IT>PS>fs>[2xBlood/Death](>RPdump)

...so you give your FSs more KM lead time, and do not lose Blood Plague ticks due to poor PS spacing in Unholy Presence.


On PTR HB

Impurity obviously favors DW much more than TS favors 2H. Considering that Impurity is almost a 20% boost to the bulk of DW rotation damage, there is simply no way for a DW build with HB to be competitive because the DK has to give up Impurity for it. If Blizzard's intention for the HB nerf is to reign in DW damage, then the the nerf makes no sense. It only hurts 2H since no competitive DW build will ever pick HB over Impurity.

On live for 2H, if you don't have Impurity, even OB averages higher damage than HB does. I just don't see the point of nerfing HB after moving it to tier 9, unless Blizzard just wants to reign in Frost AE and Rime proc burstiness.

On PTR OB

Blizzard ought to use the "diseaes revamp" to fold most of the OB glyph damage bonus into the base skill. Okay, they screwed up designing the original skill, so fix it. It is laughable for a primary offensive ability to need a glyph to boost its damage by 25% in order to be viable. The "disease revamp" is the perfect opportunity to remedy that mistake and make the decision whether to use the glyph mathematically interesting.

 

calanin

This is something that will have to be tested. It is hard to say that the new Pestilence glyph refreshing FF on the current target will not cause improved icy talon effect. I would guess not but as nobody on the PTR has discovered the new Pestilence glyph to even say if its a major or minor etc then it is hard to say for sure.

 

Khaosknight

Lets not forget, an IT-less rotation forgoes the highest RP per Rune ability that we have. With all things included, 1 IT is 25 Runic power, which is 78% of a single frost strike. With that In mind, I find myself seriously doubting a rotation which uses a non-damaging 10 RP ability instead of a highly damaging 25 RP ability (Icy touch also scales ridiculously well, having up to 5 + damage modifiers. Once our gear is full t8 and our AP reaches critical mass IT will look even better.

 

Krewshal

I like sticking with the good ole' 0/32/39

 

zephimir

I was wondering, in a 0/45/26 build, why don't we take tundra stalker instead of Impurity ?
Should I'm right, the spells affected by impurity in IT/PS rotation are IT and its frost fever. On the over hand tundra stalker affects IT/PS FS Blood Plague and Frost Fever.

Thank you in advance for your answers.

 

Bloodscape

So this is what i'm currently looking @.


Frost 3/50/16+2 req 4pt7
IT-PS-PE-ERW

OB-OB-OB-FS-FS
PE-BS-OB-OB-FS-FS
REPEAT

Now the real question is our little ghoul friend as good without NotD, and should we opt for a pest build or go for the standard.

IT-PS-OB-BS-BS-FS-FS
OB-OB-OB-FS-FS

So I am disliking the pest rotation more and more. Yes i have a tight rotation with less buttons to push but if i loose contact with the boss for 21+ seconds i loose my carefree rotation.

ATM with a 32/39 dw build my ghoul is average ~10% of my dps.

So this changes my personal opinion quite a bit.

I'm starting to wonder about blood/frost hybrid spec.

Say 23/45/0+3

PS-IT-BS-BS-OB-FS-FS
OB-BS-BS-BS-BS-FS-FS

Something like this seems to be one of the best. especially for large BS hits.